Police hid tapes that put green protesters in the clear

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Climate activists protest at the coal fired power station at Ratcliffe on Soar in 2009Tom Pilston for The Times

David Brown

Last updated at 12:00AM, January 15 2011

The trial of six environmental campaigners accused of trying to shut one of
Britain’s biggest power stations collapsed because police withheld secret
recordings, The Times can reveal.

When prosecution lawyers abandoned the case last week, it appeared that an
undercover police officer who had switched sides had compromised the case.
But The Times has learnt that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)
promptly abandoned the trial when it was informed that Nottinghamshire
Police had suppressed secret tapes that “fatally undermined the case against
the protesters”.

The recordings were of meetings between the campaigners at which the
undercover officer Mark Kennedy was